1. Field
Embodiments relate to a semiconductor device and, more particularly, to three-dimensional (3D) semiconductor devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
Semiconductor devices have been highly integrated to provide high performance and low costs demanded by users. The integration density of semiconductor devices may directly affect the costs of the semiconductor devices, so highly integrated semiconductor devices are demanded. The integration density of a conventional two-dimensional (2D) or planar memory device may be mainly determined by an area where a unit memory cell occupies, and thus, the integration density of the conventional 2D memory device may be greatly affected by a technique of forming fine patterns. However, since extremely high-priced apparatuses are needed to form fine patterns, the integration density of 2D memory devices continues to increase but is still limited.
Semiconductor devices (e.g., three-dimensional (3D) memory devices) including three-dimensionally arranged memory cells have been developed to overcome the above limitations. However, reliability of the 3D memory devices may be deteriorated by structural characteristics thereof.